I am finally back to work after a long slow recovery from surgery. I was out of the office for six weeks and during that leave I had some time to browse the internets. One of my world wide hangouts is Work It, Mom of course.

Recently I asked a question in a Work It, Mom forum trying to uncover how women view their career and what they feel holds them back from achieving career success. The results were not entirely shocking to me. It was noted by one mother that she feels raising her children is her top priority at this point. A list of mothers noted something that I have heard from women before.

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I see a trend.

I talk to people online, in person and by phone daily. Some of my conversations are incredibly intimate and highly confidential. Some are a bit more relaxed. Some of these conversations are planned and some are impromptu but the one thing I am seeing in a lot of conversations these days is…

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One of the things on my mind lately is the subject of career management. I feel like over the years I have been incredibly lucky when it comes to my career. I never really knew what I wanted to be when I grew up. I didn’t go to college until I was 23 and when I did I only pursued an Associates degree as I still wasn’t convinced I had decided on the career of my dreams.

Midway through college I realized that while I enjoyed the social side of a career in broadcasting, I wasn’t convinced that broadcasting was truly my passion. As college graduation drew closer I decided to leverage my broadcasting and media training to get a job in advertising which I did. After a successful stint at a local ad agency I was pursued by a client to join their organization.

I had some reservations about going after the opportunity presented to me. First of all, it was an area that I had no training or experience in and second I was fearful that I would regret leaving the agency because the reality was, I very much loved my job at the agency and the people I worked with.

After much thought and consideration and even a handful of conversations with the manager of the ad agency I decided that pursuing the new position was the way to go. While I had no formal training or experience in the area (the client that wanted to hire me knew this) I was confident of two things:

1. I could do the job and what I didn’t know I could learn.
2. The company I would be moving to was much larger and would likely have many more opportunities for career growth than the advertising agency I worked for.

It turned out that my confidence was spot on. I was given great opportunities in my new role and gained experiences I never dreamed possible. It was an amazing place to be for someone who still couldn’t quite pinpoint (at the age of 27) what she wanted to be when she grew up.

Making the decision to leap into something completely new and unfamiliar became rule #1 in managing my career. Over the years I have taken many risks and tried a lot of new things. The experiences I have had (flying on corporate jets at the age of 28) and the skills I have learned (how to stand in a room full of stuffed suits and win them over) have been essential in getting me to where I am today professionally.

Some of my rules for caretaking my career are:

1. Fear is for ninnies. I have left positions that I loved over and over again to take a chance on something new. Sometimes those moves have been scary as hell but I use that fear to motivate me, not stop me.
2. Network like you brush your teeth: DAILY. I manage my professional network each and every day. I am constantly reaching out to former colleagues to keep current on where they are at, how they are doing (personally and professionally) and where I might be able to help them out. When I find information that might be useful to someone in my network I share it with them promptly. I talk to my core group of recruiters about 4 times a year whether I’m looking for a position or not.
3. She shoots! She scores! I set goals for my career regularly. In my 20’s my goal was to make a six figure income doing a job I was crazy in love with by the time I was 30 years old. I missed that goal by 1 year but I still accomplished the most important part: I had a career that I loved and I was paid well to do it. I also set goals for myself related to training and career advancement. Nobody is going to take care of my career for me so I am constantly mindful of where I am and where I want to be.

What do you do to manage your career and do you feel like you have been successful at doing so?